Huntsville gazette., 1887-12-24
ECCENTRIC Mr.. HULL
A Millionaire Whose Eccentricity Takes .
Philant hropic Turn.

A Millionaire Whose Eccentricfty Takes .
Philanthropic Turn.
By the common consent of his neigh
bors, c. j. Hull, whose wealth is estimated
at 100000, is the queerest of the many
queer characters in Chicago, SAYS the
Philadelphia Times. There is no doubt
Mr. Hull is queer, very queer; and what
makes him seem especially queer to Chi
eago people is that, having made a com.
Portable fortune himself, he should devote
his time and a portion Of his money to
making other people comfortable. Mr..
Hull's hobby is that of establishing labor
ing men in houses Of their own. He boasts
Of having put over two thousand families
in houses of their own in Chicago, nearly
as many in Lincoln, Neb., about one thou
sand in Savannah, Ga. and several hum
dred in Baltimore, His method is to buy
suburban property cheaply, subdivide it
into small lots, and build homes upon
it for working men. He has taken many
a man without dollar, put him into his
own home and given him all the time he
needed to pay for his comfortable resi-
dence. Some of Mr.. HulPs other queer
characteristics are not so benevolent as
the one above mentioned. He is a Con-
necticut Yankee, and very close fisted
in his dealings outside of his transactions
with the cass he desires to benefit. He
went to Chicago forty-one years ago, and
acquired his wealth by prudent invest
ments in city real estate. He married
and had several children, but subsequent
ly lost his entire family. One of his hob
bies is an implicit belief in fish as brain
food. 1t is told OF him that for over four
years he fed his family on Goldfish, having
no other meats on the table. Perhaps
this may account for the early death
of all but himself The hired girl lived,
however, and grew so aristocratic on this
phosphorescent diet that she refused to
work any longer, and as Mr. Hull did not
propose matrimony, finally left him. He
always did the chores around the house,
backing his own shoes and those of
every body else, even to the servants. He
owned and drove a buggy team, and when
one OF the horses died, instead of buying
another or using q pair of shafts, he
hitched up the surviving beast alongside
the pole, making a very funny turnout.
In person Mr. Hull is a man Of imposing
physique, six feet in height and patri-
archial in appearance. He still swings
heavy dumbbells and keeps himself in the
best possible physical condition. Like
many eccentric people, be is somewhat of
literary turn, and has compiled book
chiefly composed Of terse epigrammatic
sentences from letters he has written dur
ing the last thirty-five years, few Of
which are subioined:
Lawyers have not as much conscience
as the ten commandments require Of the
followers OF the moral law. They do not
practice under that ancient code, and
perhaps regard it as repealed or unc onsti-
tutional."
"If circumstances will not allow boy
to have mother, the next best relative
for him in the order OF nature is grand
mother"
'The man who goes earliest to dinner at
a hotel has the best chance for good
nat"
Many men think they think, but those
who do think know It,"
''Small men are always in fashion,"
These quaint sayings show that if Mr..
Hull is queer and cranky, there's method
in his madness. His success in business
also attests this fact, while his large
hearted benevolenca leads to the concu-
sion that the wor d would be much the
better - people possessing Mr.. Hul's
peculiar typo Of queerness were more
plentiful.